Comment: Citing an undisclosed study by officials,Turun Sanomat claims some refugees use social welfare subsidy to pay back people that brought them to Finland under shady conditions. While we know the cost to be 10,000 euros per person, according to the Turku-based daily, nowhere are we told if this is a widespread problem never mind the source(s) of the study.

Certainly it is a serious problem if one has to pay someone to leave a war-zone. If I were living in such a country, I’d do everything possible to leave and relocate elsewhere, even pay money, than live in a place where my family could be put in harm’s way.

Apart from showing the ordeal and suffering that some asylum seekers and refugees face in Europe, what does the Turun Sanomat article want to convey? In light of the present negative atmosphere in Finland, such a story does not invite constructive debate on an issue but reinforces instead the notion that asylum seekers are dishonest or “welfare shoppers”

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Nowhere in this article does it explain how the coastguard concludes that these remittances are going to clandestine travel agents and not to family members in dire circumstances. A family member who leaves under duress but nevertheless continues to send financial support to the family left behind is normally understood in a more favourable light than this. It adds insult to injury to cast unfounded aspersions at the senders of remittances while systematically frustrating their efforts at family reunification.

Where is the evidence concerning the recipients of these payments?

This is also an opportunity to call attention to shameless profiteering by businesses like Western Union, which charge exorbitant fees for administering these transfers, ignoring a World Bank recommendation that no more than 5 per cent should be taken in transaction fees.

If the Finnish government provided a certified, secure and cheap means of sending remittances, then it could monitor the recipients accordingly. Of course that might leave an inconvenient paper trail when officials subsequently try to dispute the relationship between the sender and receiver, but officials would never do such a thing deliberately, would they? ̶T̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶w̶h̶y̶ ̶o̶v̶e̶r̶ ̶o̶n̶e̶ ̶h̶u̶n̶d̶r̶e̶d̶ ̶p̶e̶r̶m̶i̶t̶ ̶r̶e̶f̶u̶s̶a̶l̶s̶ ̶w̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶q̶u̶a̶s̶h̶e̶d̶ ̶a̶f̶t̶e̶r̶ ̶D̶N̶A̶ ̶t̶e̶s̶t̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶r̶e̶v̶e̶a̶l̶e̶d̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶a̶u̶t̶h̶o̶r̶i̶t̶y̶ ̶h̶a̶d̶ ̶n̶o̶ ̶c̶a̶u̶s̶e̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶d̶i̶s̶b̶e̶l̶i̶e̶v̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶a̶p̶p̶l̶i̶c̶a̶n̶t̶.̶